


Snake Charmer

by Smokey310



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Dad Music, M/M, Road Trips, demon!Daishou
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-15
Updated: 2016-05-15
Packaged: 2018-06-08 16:50:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6864601
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Smokey310/pseuds/Smokey310
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I'm not leaving here without a soul,” Daishou said with finality. Maybe by now Kuroo was scared enough to be bargained with. Unfortunately, that did not seem to be the case - at least Daishou was pretty sure that a scared human would do something else than just roll his eyes.</p>
<p>“Oop, sorry, I'm fresh out of souls, what a pity.”</p>
<p>Daishou reminded Kuroo of his fangs by showing a toothy grin. “You know,” he drawled. “As ready as I am to believe that you're a soulless creature, I'm not actually stupid.”</p>
<p>“And neither am I,” said Kuroo. “Well – not stupid enough to make a deal with the devil, so tough luck, I guess. Maybe you can wander off and find some worm who's willing to exchange its soul for a front end.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Snake Charmer

**Author's Note:**

  * For [polarRabbit](https://archiveofourown.org/users/polarRabbit/gifts).



> This is a fill for the following prompt:
> 
> "You summoned me by accident and now I’m staying with you till you make a deal with me cause it’s difficult traveling to hell and back and I’m not leaving till we make a deal" Daishou/Kuroo
> 
> asked by [buckingrabbit](buckingrabbit.tumblr.com) on tumblr. 
> 
> This got waaaay longer than I planned, so I'm putting it up as it's own fic instead of adding it to the mini-fic collection.

Daishou looked at the puny human cowering before him, and bared his fangs.

„What do you _mean_ 'summoned by accident'?“ he hissed, repeating what that insolent creature had just told him without as much as blinking an eyelid. His name was Kuroo Tetsurou – that much Daishou had already found out – right before the fact that Kuroo didn't have a deal for him. Which was just something that _didn't happen_!

„That I never meant to have a huge slimy worm like you suddenly appearing in my tent. In fact, I paid good money to make it snake-proof,“ Kuroo said – his words standing in stark contrast to his cowering position. 

Truth be told, the cowering was not only on Kuroo's part – actually, Daishou was cowering as well, because they were stuck together in a tiny tent that was not meant for more than two people, and Daishou and his long lower half definitely took up more room than the average human being. 

Still, Kuroo would do well to realize that he was talking to a _demon_ , who could turn him to _stone_... No, actually, Daishou was not a child of Medusa's, no matter how much he wanted to be. Still, he could do really bad things to Kuroo, like... mock him!

„Slimy?“ hissed Daishou, scrunching his nose. „My personal hygiene happens to be impeccable – unlike yours, might I add. Have you ever heard of a thing called a 'comb'?“

Kuroo immediately bristled – Daishou must have hit a sore point. „I just so happen to be on a trip around the world,“ Kuroo tried to defend the mop on his head. „A crocodile must've eaten my hair wax – it's a real tragedy.“ He let himself fall back on his butt to look up at Daishou with a scowl.

Daishou couldn't really be the only one left to cower here, so he decided to get rid of his beautiful tail and exchange it for a more tent-friendly pair of legs. He made sure to still look as otherworldly as possible, hoping that his two golden nipple rings and the split tongue were enough to remind Kuroo that he was sharing his tent with a demon. 

“You must have summoned me for _something_!” he said, when Kuroo still refused to look impressed.

“I keep telling you, it was an accident. Now shoo! Slither away!”

The nerve this human possessed... it was almost impressive. Still, Daishou was actually curious about what exactly happened here.

“It doesn't work that way,” he explained, walking up and down the tent, which meant turning around after each step – so basically, he was just doing a pirouette. He stopped as soon as he noticed. “You can't just summon a demon by accident. You need an artifact. You need a ritual.”

“Well, I might have picked up some enchanted artifact while I was traveling,” said Kuroo. The statement was followed by a pointed yawn. “I visited a lot of countries, collected a lot of souvenirs. These things just happen.”

“Sssuuuure,” drawled Daishou as he leaned down into Kuroo's personal space. “Well, you see... the thing is – it's rather uncomfortable to be pulled out of hell.” - And he wasn't even lying here! Maybe exaggerating a little, but still, it was an impressive amount of truth for someone like Daishou. “It's a long way up to the surface. I have to get past all of these tortured souls who just won't stop _screaming_. I don't even know what for, no one's coming to help them, so why can't they just suffer quietly? Anyway, after the tortured souls come the lower demons – pesky little imps and goblins who try to muss up my neat hairdo, probably because they're envious. The only thing they can grow on their own ugly heads are warts with more warts on them. Then, of course, there's the fiddlers...”

“Okay, okay, I get it!” Kuroo said – he had already reached the end of the tent behind him, as he was escaping from Daishou's intruding face. “So, what kind of magic dance do I have to perform to get you to sashay away?”

Daishou made sure to minimize the remaining distance between their faces and squint as intimidatingly as he could. 

“I'm not leaving here without a soul,” he said with finality. Maybe by now Kuroo was scared enough to be bargained with. Unfortunately, that did not seem to be the case - at least Daishou was pretty sure that a scared human would do something else than just roll his eyes.

“Oop, sorry, I'm fresh out of souls, what a pity.”

Daishou reminded Kuroo of his fangs by showing a toothy grin. “You know,” he drawled. “As ready as I am to believe that you're a soulless creature, I'm not actually stupid.”

“And neither am I,” said Kuroo, escaping to the side, since the tent was still stretched against his back. “Well – not stupid enough to make a deal with the devil, so tough luck, I guess. Maybe you can wander off and find some worm who's willing to exchange its soul for a front end.”

What an _irritating_ little shit he was. Daishou was close to spitting actual venom, but he held himself back at the last second. If he killed this guy, he wouldn't get a deal at all, and that was just not worth the arduous journey to the surface. 

“You really pissss me off!” he hissed, and Kuroo actually startled for a second. It was enough to satisfy Daishou for now. “But have it your way,” he added with a shrug. “I'm just gonna stick around until you change your mind. This may be some well-needed change in scenery for me. Haven't seen the color green in a while.”

Kuroo sent him a suspicious glare, probably unsure if Daishou actually meant it. But when Daishou just sat down on the tent floor and began to burrow through a huge backpack which was stuffed into the corner, Kuroo reached for a sleeping bag and threw it at his head.

“Then you better be prepared for bedbugs. They bite. And it's not just an empty promise out here.”

Daishou just grinned at him again.

“No problem,” he said. “I bite back.”

***

That same night, Daishou found himself wrapped into a sleeping bag, staring at a red tent roof, and wondering how the fuck he had ended up on a trip around the world with an irritating human who refused to give him his soul. 

“You know...” he started, not sure if Kuroo was even still awake. It didn't seem possible for him to shut up for longer than a minute. “You remind me of my demon neighbor, Kuguri. He has the same unkempt hair. Maybe you two are related.”

A groan from Kuroo's side answered the question to whether he was awake or not. “Please tell me demons need sleep?” Kuroo grumbled.

“Not really, but some of us sleep anyway. Hell can get pretty boring. I'm pretty sure Kuguri's hair is a bedhead, actually.”

Kuroo gave an even longer groan than before and turned on his other side, showing his back to Daishou. “Please just shut up.”

“I will, if you give me your soul,” Daishou grinned. 

“Very funny.”

“Then I guess you want to hear more about my neighbor Kuguri's pet, Hissy, who-”

Daishou was interrupted by a small object colliding with his face, and he immediately started up to hiss at Kuroo. How dare he throw a- a... Daishou blinked down at the object lying in his lap, and excitement suddenly got a hold of him. “Hey, that's it!” he exclaimed, grabbing the little object and waving it in Kuroo's direction. “That's it! That's my artifact!”

Kuroo sat up, still grumbling curses, his hair sticking up even more than before. He squinted – lids too heavy to be opened, but Daishou remembered that Kuroo was a human and therefore unable to see in the dark anyway, so Daishou leaned towards him and brushed the thing through Kuroo's bedhead.

“It's a comb,” Kuroo realized, grabbing blindly at it. “One that was forgotten at some cheap motel I crashed at when it rained too hard to put up a tent. I just pocketed it. Why the fuck would this be your artifact?”

“Excuse me, have you seen my beautiful hair?” said Daishou. Sadly, Kuroo couldn't see how good his hair looked even now after he had been lying down in a sleeping bag for a few hours. Damn those humans and their inability to function in the absence of sunlight. Kuroo still squinted in his general direction, hair pointing straight upwards and defying all laws of gravity. 

“I'm actually surprised to find this thing in your possession,” Daishou huffed. “Have you ever even used it?”

“Obviously, or you wouldn't be here,” Kuroo said, sounding like he wished he had never combed his hair at all. (Which was silly – it wasn't like personal grooming usually caused a demon to show up at your doorstep!) Then an idea seemed to suddenly come to him. “Wait a minute!” he said. “If I was singing a song and brushing my hair with a magic comb – would that count as a ritual?”

“It's possible...” said Daishou, hoping that Kuroo was too tired to investigate further, but Kuroo didn't have to ask anymore questions, he had already realized what the ritual was, judging from the raised eyebrow directed at Daishou.

“... your incantation is 'Snake Charmer' by Rainbow?”

“What?” Daishou said defensively. “It's a great song!”

Kuroo squinted at him for a few more seconds, but then he just lay back down in his sleeping bag.

“Guess it is,” he said.

Daishou decided to let him sleep after that. 

***

Over the course of the next few weeks, Daishou discovered what life on the surface looked like, and he slowly began to understand why Kuroo wasn't that afraid of him. Most of the other human-beings calling for Daishou just lived in the safety of their own houses, in their big cities, or idyllic country homes. Most of them didn't interact with animals more vicious than a domestic cat.

But Kuroo – Kuroo wasn't like that. Kuroo pulled venomous snakes out of his boots with nothing but a sigh, Kuroo didn't bat an eyelash at any kind of bug or spider, Kuroo went diving with sharks for _fun_! 

One time, they changed continents, and Kuroo made Daishou board an actual boat. That had been the worst few days of his long, immortal life – there was nothing but water surrounding them. It was like some kind of reverse hell. But after days of feeling miserable, they had finally reached land again, and Kuroo took him into the jungle, which was the most exciting thing Daishou had ever seen, and he was glad that he hadn't given up on the boat. 

They didn't stay in the jungle forever, sadly, but they also didn't go back on a boat, even though Kuroo could have easily chased him off with that. Maybe Kuroo was actually glad about the company, even if it was the company of a demon. 

A long train ride away waited yet another change of scenery. The desert, this time, which was not as fun as the jungle, but not that bad either. They rented a land rover, and Daishou drove and almost crashed a car for the first time in his life. Kuroo didn't let him drive anymore after that, and Daishou didn't even complain. He was perfectly content with lounging in the passenger seat, legs or tail – depending on the mood – sprawled over Kuroo's lap as Kuroo was staring at the road in front of him for hours on end. Daishou was staring at Kuroo instead. Staring at the straight line of his nose, the hair falling into his eyes, the small curve of his lips as he was humming along to the only CD he had brought with him.

Daishou didn't tell Kuroo that there was a warm, vibrating sensation seizing his whole body whenever 'Snake Charmer' came on – that close to the magic comb, the incantation was enough to have an effect on him, tried to pull him in, tried to call him. Only he was already there, he couldn't possibly come any closer.

One of Kuroo's hands sunk down from the steering wheel to Daishou's tail, thumb absentmindedly stroking over the smooth snakeskin. He probably didn't realize how intimate of a gesture it was – to Kuroo, the tail was outlandish, exotic, something he was curious about. Daishou wondered if he'd had done the same if it were legs spread across his lap. 

_Mystery man what's your plan_  
_Fancy face, got no place_  
_Snake charmer_

Dio's voice roaring through the car was oddly fitting. Rainbow always understood him. Daishou closed his eyes to the warm feeling tingling under his skin, and hummed along. 

_Oh sparkle eyes_  
_Got no ties_  
_Oh shiny boots_  
_Close your door_  
_He's on the loose_  
_Snake charmer_

***

“So, are you just gonna haunt me forever now?”

Daishou tore his eyes from the rising sun to throw Kuroo a questioning look. They were sitting on the top of a mountain to watch the sunrise. The air was coming alive around them. Birds cawing in the distance, insects buzzing by their heads, the smell of warmth engulfing them with every inch the sun rose higher on the sky. When Daishou looked at it, he was reminded of the fiery pit he called home. Maybe Kuroo also saw hell when he looked at the sun. 

“What's with the sudden question?” he asked, genuinely curious.

Kuroo just shrugged his shoulders. “I was just thinking,” he said. “Somehow you're not even trying to be bad company anymore.” 

Daishou was appalled by that accusation. Was Kuroo implying that he didn't care about the deal anymore? “Just last evening I turned your grilled fish into a plate full of maggots!” he reminded Kuroo, but Kuroo just grinned at him.

“And they were delicious,” he said. “Well, maybe not delicious, but I've eaten worse.”

He had – Daishou had personally witnessed it. Still, that did not mean that Daishou had given up. Besides - 

“I don't exactly see you trying to get rid of me either!” he pointed out, remembering how Kuroo had never made him go back on another boat. 

“You're not giving me another chance. I won't do anything that costs me my soul, so...”

Daishou blinked slowly, wondering what Kuroo meant with that. He was sure that Kuroo had noticed his intolerance for water. Surely he wasn't stupid enough to miss his chance to get out of this predicament. Maybe... maybe Kuroo was nice enough to negotiate a deal that would work for both of them?

Because by now, Daishou certainly had another deal he would be satisfied with.

Turning back to look at the sun, Daishou casually said: “I guess now that we're something like friends...”

Kuroo pretended to gag, but Daishou could hear him grin.

“I might give you something like a discount.”

“Okay, I'm listening.”

“Instead of your soul...” Daishou turned to look at Kuroo, curious about what his reaction would be. “You can give me your virginity.”

Kuroo didn't really react at all – he just stared at Daishou without blinking, until it looked like his eyes would fall out. Daishou couldn't help but fall into laughter.

“Just joking,” he said. “I know you're not a virgin.”

Kuroo continued staring, but now his eyes formed into a squint. 

“You seriously wanna bang me!” he said.

“What can I say...” Daishou shrugged. “I'm a demon. I'm not exactly prim and prudish.”

If he didn't read the signs wrong, Kuroo was actually interested in the offer. Interested, but skeptical. 

“And then you're just gonna suck my soul out through my dick or what?”

“I'm not a damn incubus!” Daishou protested. 

“You're a snake,” said Kuroo. “So you don't seem very trustworthy to me.”

Smart guy, he was. But this time, Daishou hadn't even thought as far as to deceive him. All these weeks spent in his company, Daishou couldn't help but getting attracted to Kuroo. He blamed the damn song, but really – that had probably nothing to do with it. Even before they had listened to the song on repeat in that car, Daishou had felt... _something_. That something had been in every quick-witted word Kuroo had thrown at his head, and in every strand of hair sticking to Kuroo's forehead in the humid jungle air, and in every spider Daishou had sent to crawl into Kuroo's sleeping bag, unable to make him scream. 

So who could blame Daishou if he wanted to make him scream in a different way?

“Fine, it's your call,” Daishou finally said, when Kuroo just continued to squint at him. “You can enjoy some more nice maggots for dinner for the rest of your life, you don't seem to mind.”

He turned back to look at the sun, which was fully visible now, and pretended to ignore Kuroo. In reality, he was listening closely – listening to the scratch of a pebble over the rocky surface they were sitting on, to the thoughtful little huff Kuroo gave, to the small rustle of clothes when Kuroo moved a little closer, the wind whistling through the rocks, and finally, a defeated sigh.

“Just one thing,” Kuroo said. 

Daishou hoped that, when he turned to give him an expectant look, he didn't seem too excited.

“Get rid of that awful split tongue!”

And there it was – they finally had a deal. It wasn't that easy to change his tongue into a human one with a grin tugging at his lips like that, but he managed. 

“Aaaaah!” he said, sticking out his new tongue for Kuroo to see.

Then, Kuroo's hands were on his face, pulling him into a kiss.

***

Not even a day had gone by since he was back in hell, and Daishou already missed the surface. 

Well, maybe it wasn't the surface that he missed. More like, a surface-dweller. But he refused to acknowledge that – besides, he had stuff to do, down here. Souls to torture. Newcomers to scare. And Kuguri had asked him to look after Hissy while he was gone to collect a few souls. 

All in all, Daishou was glad that he got to relax again, after weeks of exploring the surface. He didn't miss all that water up there. The fire was much nicer. Cozy. 

But not only fire was cozy. Sleeping bags and small tents were cozy. The smell of fish sizzling over a fire was cozy. Passenger seats in rented land rovers and deep voices humming to 'Snake Charmer' and a warm feeling spreading under his skin were cozy. So cozy, he could practically feel it.

Daishou noticed too late that he hadn't just imagined the feeling – it got stronger and stronger within seconds, until it wasn't cozy anymore, until it felt like a punch in the guts, and then he was pulled backwards, like so many times before. He could pinpoint the exact moment it would start.

The damn _screaming_.

If he'd had any air, he would have liked to scream himself, but the force was still tugging at him, still pulling, dragging, wrenching him out of hell. 

He only found his voice again when he could feel the nasty little fingers of an imp tearing at his perfect hair. 

“GET THE FUCK OFF!” he yelled at the creature, swatting at it like an annoying fly. Why the hell did another artifact of his have to be found so soon after the last one? These damn humans and their insatiable need to make deals with the devil, couldn't they do any fucking thing on their own?

Daishou finally managed to punch the imp hard enough to make it fly away, shaking it's little fist at him, and Daishou almost thought it was over, but then the fiddles started, and he screamed.

There was one second – only one – at the end of the journey, when everything went black. Daishou had to use that one second to make himself presentable. Luckily, he had the help of a little magic to make his hair fall back in place, form the golden nipple rings, elongate his beautiful snake tail, and choose a nice pattern to adorn his human skin. 

He had enough experience to complete the transformation in that single second – from lying curled-up on the sofa in his hell-house, dressed in only an old t-shirt and chewing on a bit of coal, he changed to a beautiful, dangerous creature, able to awake fear in anyone who laid eyes on him.

Anyone but one.

Daishou looked down at Kuroo, who sat in front of his tent, brushing the comb through his hair and grinning up at him. He was still singing.

_Close your door_  
_He's on the move_  
_I see him coming out_  
_There's no hope for you, ooh_  
_Snake charmer_  
_Snake charmer_

There was no point in putting on a show for Kuroo. Kuroo had actually seen him dressed in only a t-shirt and chewing on a bit of coal before, and it made no difference to him. Daishou turned his tail back into legs and scowled at Kuroo.

„Seriously?“ he grumbled. 

Kuroo stopped combing his hair – it didn't change anything anyway– and stood up from the rocky ground. He was still in the mountains, but at a different place than before, already on his way back down. Daishou found himself wondering where he would go next. 

„What can I say?“ said Kuroo, stepping closer. „It's a great song.“

Daishou couldn't find it in himself to resist the grin tugging at his lips, and Kuroo didn't even wait for another sign before he leaned in and kissed him. 

„I guess it is,“ Daishou said, panting, when they broke apart. „It really, really is.“

**Author's Note:**

> if anything in there was not actually english, pls tell me :'D


End file.
